By: Natasha Archary
City of Johannesburg (COJ) has appealed to residents to be patient as parts of Johannesburg are still without water. This after a scheduled 54-hour shutdown of supply which was brought to the public’s attention last week.
The planned water cut commenced from Monday, 15 November, to allow work on the raw water pipe which supplies the Vereeniging water purification plant.
Now more than 54-hours later, parts of the north, south and west of the city remains affected.
While COJ assures residents that water tankers have been dispersed to reduce the impact on consumers, many areas claim there have been no contingency plans.
Many schools and places of business have had to close during the water cut due to sanitary concerns. With some requesting learners to bring their own bottled water to school during exams.
UPDATE: Please take note of the updated list of areas due to be affected by the 54hr planned water outage from 5am on 15 Nov #JoziSaveWater #JoburgUpdates ^NJ pic.twitter.com/MeTgrw2En9
— City of Joburg (@CityofJoburgZA) November 12, 2021
Meanwhile, Rand Water’s Chief Operating Officer, Sipho Mosai said on Monday that the cut will not be a total shutdown.
Instead there will be a 25% reduction in supply and they will need to cut 600 million litres of its 4600 million litres supply to the province a day.
Some areas have gone without water since Monday, relying solely on water tankers. Parts of Johannesburg including Coronationville, Bergbron and Westbury are among those affected.
The water cut has affected hospitals with the Gauteng Department of Health arranging water tankers and mobile toilets at some facilities.
COJ has not given residents an estimated time for the return of supply.
Also read: 54 hour water cut scheduled for Gauteng next week
